Caught Red-Handed
by wolf08
Summary: Amidst their private travels, Sasuke and Sakura have a misunderstanding which forces him to admit something he wasn't quite ready to admit yet… Written for SasuSaku Month 2017 (prompt: heartbreak hotel)


**A/N:** So I've been itching to write something silly and light and I felt this prompt would do it for me. I've also been meaning to play around in the present tense so here goes. Hope you enjoy. :)

 **Summary:** Amidst their private travels, Sasuke and Sakura have a misunderstanding which forces him to admit something he wasn't quite ready to admit yet… Written for SasuSaku Month 2017 (prompt: heartbreak hotel)

 **Genre:** Humour / Romance

 **Disclaimer:** All characters belong to the great Masashi Kishimoto.

* * *

 **Caught Red-Handed**

Sakura is a dangerous person to cross right now.

Fuming, she smashes her way through the inn's front door, while inadvertently ripping it clean from its hinges, and makes a beeline for _anywhere_ but near the man she is currently traveling with.

In this moment, Sakura can't quite recall which village they're in (she is feeling quite delirious with rage, mind you), only that coming here was a mistake. She tosses her brand new shopping bag to the ground, and it conveniently lands in a puddle of mud, and storms away down the ramshackle dirt road.

She and Sasuke Uchiha, the love of her life and the most dangerous man on earth, are amidst their private travels following his redemption journey. Just as she always dreamed it, he returned to his homeland after years of roaming the lands, swept Sakura off her feet and whisked her away into his mysterious world of wanderlust adventures.

(Actually, it was more like: "Hn. Still want to come?" And then they proceeded to spend two months camping in various forests. But never mind the details).

Eventually their travels brought them _here_ (er… maybe they were somewhere in Iwa? Sakura really hadn't been paying attention) to a village that Sasuke had undoubtedly stopped in before, with how many people seemed to recognize him. They were treated kindly upon their arrival which seemed to put Sasuke in a good enough mood to suggest they have dinner at a food-serving establishment like normal people do.

I mean, it's not that Sakura is _complaining_ about the nutritious menu the wilderness has to offer, but there is something indisputably compelling about a hot meal that she doesn't have to virtually kill over.

Anyways, upon their arrival in this unfamiliar little village, Sasuke went off to make reservations at the only inn in town ( _I'm going to sleep in a_ bed! _I'm going to take a_ shower!), and Sakura insisted that she needed to run an urgent errand, which was actually just shopping for clothes that were clean and presentable for public eyes (seriously, she was going to have to _peel_ her current outfit off).

So she picked out a charming yellow number that clashed with her pastel pink hair but was the only thing that fit so would have to do and set out to the inn to meet her travelling companion.

Or whatever he was. Ex-teammate? Dear friend (who she was utterly infatuated with)?

Sasuke had made absolutely no effort to establish what was going on between them or why he sought her out in the first place. And as wonderful as it had been to re-immerse herself into his life and spend cherished quality bonding time with her beloved, as far as Sakura could tell, this was anything _but_ a romantic getaway.

Nothing even remotely _close_ to intimate had passed between them aside from the odd hug, pat or hand squeeze. And sure, Sasuke had never been the touchy or emotionally expressive type, but she hoped he might have warmed up at least the _slightest bit_ after being alone with her for 1,440 hours straight.

Maybe he's only interested in having a friend accompany him on his journey. Maybe he lumps her in with the rest of them at home and keeps her around for old time's sake, for the nostalgic memories of happier times. Maybe he thinks her feelings for him are long gone, like they should be.

So maybe, just maybe, when Sakura follows residuals of Sasuke's chakra signature up to a hotel room on the second floor, she should be unsurprised to find him behind a locked door with another woman.

Fast-forward to the present moment. Sakura is a very dangerous person to cross right now indeed.

She curses her stupidity. Sure they were _clothed_ (thank the _Gods_ ) but their proximity, with tall, dark and handsome Sasuke towering over the girl, practically _pinning_ her to the wall, and the look of utter terror that graced his features upon Sakura's arrival, told all.

Sakura didn't catch nor did she give a shit about what the woman looked like, only that she was clearly no stranger to Sakura's travelling companion. _He's been gone for years, knows people here… and probably has history here._ It all makes perfect sense! Sakura was just too ignorant to catch on until it was staring her right in the face with a guilty tail between its legs.

 _Idiot. I'm an idiot._

Heck, Sakura dated people in Sasuke's absence, back when she lost hope that he would ever return. Well… none of them made it past the first date because she was an outright mess devoid of feeling for any man except for one, but she at least made an _attempt_ to get on with her life. It just seems like Sasuke is better at getting on with his, even though, unbeknownst to him, he's taking Sakura's heart with him in the process.

Angry tears collect in her eyes as Sakura punches an undeserving brick wall with a riveting crack. Thankfully the wall isn't part of a building or else she'd have to pay for it sooner than later. No, this wall lines the parameters of the village and separates it from its foresty outskirts.

Then she senses Sasuke's chakra approaching at an alarmingly fast rate.

Sakura narrows her eyes and glares over her shoulder as he approaches. She notices instantly that he left his travelling cloak back at the hotel room, which means that he's getting all _comfortable_ there, is he? Settling in for the night now, is he? Her blood boils.

"You've detected a threat?" he asks, mistaking her rage as being directed against an enemy. His eyes dart around and he rests his hand on the handle of the sword at his hip.

"Yeah. I have."

Sakura fires a kunai at the space between his eyes.

As quick as a flash (unsurprisingly, to Sakura's slight dismay), Sasuke brings up his sword to deflect it and the kunai drops to the ground.

There is unabashed shock written all over his face and he abandons his collected stance. "Sakura, it's me," he says as his Sharingan whirl to life, like he's trying to discern what genjutsu came over her.

But Sakura just squares herself up to him and folds her arms. "Who was that?" she demands, not caring that she sounds like a jealous, hyper-possessive ex-girlfriend.

"What are you talking about?" Sasuke seems genuinely perplexed.

 _Ha. You can't play dumb with me._

"The woman in the hotel room," she snaps.

There is a hesitant pause wherein Sasuke opens and closes his mouth. And it's enough for Sakura to clue in that he's hiding something. "…An old friend."

Promptly, Sakura take a reckless swing at his jaw.

Now, Sakura's reckless swings are normally enough to scare off any fellow ninja with half a brain (since her reckless swings are better than most ninjas' _best_ swings), but Sasuke is the most dangerous man alive with the sharpest battle instincts around, so he catches her punch, though it pushes him back a couple of feet.

Sakura comes to her senses.

Right, now, it's probably best _not_ to start a fist fight with a man this powerful, especially since she's practicing channeling her temper through non-physical means.

So instead she turns on her heel and stalks away, towards the gap in the brick wall leading out of the village. But, of course, Sasuke follows her.

"Sakura," he says from somewhere behind, a frustrated edge in his tone.

She ignores him.

" _Sakura,_ " he repeats with a little more urgency. "The woman works there. She isn't a threat."

 _La la la! I'm not listening!_

"Sakura!" Sasuke shouts and it works to throw Sakura off course because, God forbid, this must be the first time Sakura has heard her ex-teammate raise his voice in _years_.

A blink later and Sasuke is standing in front of her, frowning and scanning her face intently. "We need to clarify what's going on here," he says.

"Ha! What else could there be to clarify? You've made it plain and clear that there is _nothing_ going on between us." Sakura sticks her nose up in the air and shoulders her way past him. "Now, if you'll excuse me."

Sasuke looks like he just took a Chidori to the face when he snatches her arm and drags her back to him. Sakura snarls at his painfully tight grip but feels a tinge of satisfaction that he finally seems to be getting it.

He closes his eyes and releases a sigh, and the frown lines are etched deep in his brow. "You think I was… _with_ that woman?" And in his shock, his grip slackens just enough for Sakura to wriggle free and stumble back, massaging her arm and sending a soothing pulse of medical chakra to the tender area.

Colour rises to her face. _Obviously, you idiot,_ she thinks. Is he _really_ going to force her to admit to her irrational jealousy and unspoken romantic pursuits?

Yeah, probably.

Sakura grits her teeth. "You _locked_ yourselves in a hotel room. And I saw how you were looking at her. You _know_ each other, have history, or something."

Then Sasuke actually reaches up to pinch the bridge of his nose, and it has to be one of the most dramatic gestures she's ever seen him pull off. "I was _questioning_ her," he corrects.

"About what, might I ask, that needed to be asked behind a locked door?" Sakura probes. To her knowledge, they were just stopping in this town to relax – not to do interrogating of any sort. This didn't add up.

Sasuke doesn't move his hand from his face. "About our arrangement," he says.

"What arrangement?" _Damn it feels good to be on the offensive,_ Sakura thinks.

Sasuke releases another sigh and beckons for Sakura to join him in sitting up against the half-demolished wall. Sakura obliges cautiously and watches him rest the back of his head on the brick surface and stare up at the clear sky like it would tell him what to say.

After a long silence, he speaks again. "About us travelling together."

But Sakura isn't getting it. "Why would you need to ask someone _else_ about _our –"_

"I want to share a bedroom tonight."

 _Come again?_

Now it's Sakura's turn to open her mouth and close it again. She is thoroughly flabbergasted and feeling rather faint. Well. This conversation is taking quite a sharp turn and Sasuke is still looking anywhere but at her.

"So you were asking her…"

"…for advice. Where to ask you. How to ask you. And it was _not_ going to be _here_ or like _this._ "

Sakura takes a quiet moment to mull everything over. So Sasuke _is_ pursuing a new level in their relationship after all. _Now_ it makes sense why he was so insistent on going out for dinner (perhaps that was going to be a date?).

She smirks in spite of everything as the butterflies flutter in her belly. _He really is clueless about this whole thing, isn't he?_ The guy can't get any less conventional. Instead of admitting he was asking her on a proper date, wining and dining her, or even _kissing_ her yet, he goes straight from two months of obscure flirting to asking her to bed.

At least this romance was years in the making – since they were kids, really, or else Sakura would have found this unsettlingly abrupt. Sure, he's a little backwards and confused, _but I love him and wouldn't have him any other way._

Sakura stands with a new rush of vigour, then reaches for Sasuke's arm and hoists him to his feet before he has a chance to even consider resisting. "Let's go," she says.

"Where?" he asks, but the slight waver in his voice indicates that he knows dinner will have to wait.


End file.
